I don’t remember what point a colleague of mine was making
when he said something to the effect that we should “put aside our emotions and
deal with the facts” to which my teacher retorted, “I believe emotions inform”.
This may be the most brilliant statement she has said thus far. The statement
itself is really a summary of many of the things she’s said in class. I love
this class and fortunately it has given me an opportunity to broaden my view of
feminism and actually find myself nodding in agreement in many instances. The
idea that “logic” and “emotion” can coexist on equal terms is what I hope we as
women can begin to strive for in feminism and in life.
The struggle of old school feminism was to basically say, “I
want what they have”. A striving for equality and power which we have been
given in many ways –more women are working and receiving higher levels of
education, but what I think we did not realize is that competing with our male
counterparts and succeeding on their level may have brought us superficial
equality and power but it has not brought us respect.
Firstly it caused a large segment of women to abandon
characteristically feminine roles and take on traditionally masculine roles, essentially
saying to men “You know what you’re right, you are better them me”. In that way
we gave men the permission to further degrade our tradition roles in hopes of
gaining power and equality. But in our entering the work place we found
ourselves again subordinated to men whether through being given menial jobs,
lower pay or never breaking the glass ceiling. Worse then this most women were
not relieved of their traditional roles at home, if they still chose to have a
family, men still do little house work and women are still the primary care
givers. So we found ourselves essentially overburdened and still searching for
power and equality in a man’s world.
We have yet to deal with the underlining issue that women
continuously face whether in a male dominated work world on in the feminine
domestic sphere. The essential issue is the very core of male- female relations;
men simply don’t value women or characteristically feminine roles, ideas,
behaviors, attitudes, etc. Men in any field will never respect women if men
simply don’t respect women in a larger more general sense. And women only
further push the idea of inferiority when we dress up in men’s suits and sit in
meeting were we silence any thought that is remotely feminine. I am being
purposefully stereotypical in order to deal with the bigger picture; in general
women are more talkative, nurturing and emotional then men. Men on the other
hand are more logical, physically stronger and one- task oriented (men are
usually poor at multitasking). But what makes being logical inherently better
then being emotional? I would argue, absolutely nothing. As my teacher
beautifully said, “emotion informs”.
This reminds me of the famous story of the Messenger of God,
peace upon him, after giving his army a command to shave their heads (I’m
cutting out most of the story to make a particular related point) they all
disobeyed. Not knowing what to do he went to his tent and told his wife , Umm
Salama, she then told him, peace upon him, to shave his on head. He listened to
her and the companions followed suit. Logically the companions should have
jumped to listen to any command of the Prophet, peace upon him, but emotionally
these were trying times. Umm Salama informed her husband through emotion not
logic. When the companions felt the
command over simply hearing if they were moved to action.
When women are respected simply for being women and for
contributing in a unique way in society we will be respected in all parts of
society. But until we pride ourselves in our femininity we can never look
forward to a society where we are equally valued as our male counterparts.*
*Note: Obviously some women are not stereotypical feminine
nor are some men stereotypically masculine. Which argues the larger part that
people should be accepted for their contributions as individual human beings
that have something unique and purposeful to offer to the world. I am of course
not including the sin of women making a point to act like men (i.e. imitating a
masculine voice) or men acting like women (i.e. speaking in a feminine voice)
this is an entirely different issue. I would rather point to someone like
Ayesha, may Allah be pleased with her, who never bore children, lead and army,
and was a great woman of knowledge or men like Imam An Nawawi, may Allah give
him mercy, who lived as an ascetic, never married and also dedicated his life
to knowledge.
